PediatricMercy Children's Hospital is a regional resource for advanced pediatric care. We offer a centralized location for advanced pediatric research, care and education, anchored in a major network of children’s specialists.

Financial AssistanceMercy recognizes the difficulty unexpected medical problems can cause to your finances. We are here to help so that patients can obtain medical benefits from federal, state and hospital programs.

Pay Your BillOur online Patient e-Billing has been developed to help you manage your busy schedule. Paying your bills online is quick and easy. Pay now.

Taking Steps to Keep Your Food Safe

There are so many ways to get sick from food—and so many things consumers can do
to make sure they don’t get sick. How many times do you hear people say, “I must
have a stomach flu?” Many times, they don’t have a stomach flu at all. They’re
sick from something they ate. Here are some guidelines everyone can follow to
keep your risk of getting sick from food as low as possible.

For leftovers
Follow the 2 hours, 2 inches, 4 days rule. That is, refrigerate or freeze within
two hours of cooking food. To make it cool as quickly as possible, keep it to a
depth of 2 inches, if you can. Freeze food after it’s been in the refrigerator
for 4 days. (The exceptions are stuffing and gravy, which should be used within
2 days.)

When grocery shopping
Keep raw foods (meat, poultry, seafood and eggs) separate from prepared foods.
Try to keep raw foods in plastic bags, so the juices don’t spill out. In warm
months, be sure to get your groceries home as soon as possible, because heat
causes bacteria to grow. If you have air conditioning in your car, turn it on.
And don’t put grocery bags in the trunk, because that’s the hottest place in the
vehicle.

Fruits and vegetables
Wash all produce under cold water. Scrub melons, because even though you don’t
eat the outside, your knife can become contaminated as it slices its way
through. Peel carrots. The main rule of thumb is to avoid exposure to the
outsides of fruits and vegetables, or wash it extremely well.

Seafood
Buy seafood only from a source you trust. Fresh fish should have clear eyes that
bulge out a bit. Flesh should be firm and shiny, and it should spring back when
pressed. It should smell fresh and mild, not strong.

Salads
You have to be especially careful with salad ingredients. Many of these grow low
to the ground, where they can be contaminated more easily from manure. Many
typical salad ingredients, like lettuce and spinach, are rough and contoured,
which makes them harder to wash well after picking. And since salads are raw,
they’re vulnerable because there’s no cooking process that can kill bacteria.
The message here is wash salad ingredients well. Wash, wash, wash. That’s your
best chance of avoiding illness.

What about chemicals and other contaminants?
It’s one thing to know how to handle the food once you’ve bought it. It’s
entirely another to decide what kinds of risks you want to take in terms of
buying organic or conventional foods, farm-raised fish or fish that swims
freely, conventionally raised chicken or free-range chicken that eats a more
natural diet, etc.

There are many people who claim that organic foods are safer, but it’s not
always easy to find them, and when you do, they’re more expensive. It’s your
decision whether you want to spend your time and money on organic foods. One
option is to make sure that a certain percentage of the foods you eat are
organic. For example, maybe you like the idea of eating eggs from hens that roam
freely, so you’re willing to spend a little more money on them.

Whatever you decide about that issue, make sure you always wash your food and
buy it from reputable sources. Store it safely and don’t keep it around too long
after you’ve cooked it. Make sure your food looks healthy—no discoloration,
wilting, mold, or odd smells. Doing these things will help you avoid many
food-borne illnesses.

Source:Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition; Center for Science in the
Public Interest; A. Weill, Eating Well for Optimum Health, HarperCollins
Publishers, 2000.